1961 - ONE EYED JACKS, Marlon Brando's only film as director

Marlon Brando was the driving force behind this revenge themed western.  His production company found the story and developed it.  Besides directing the film, Brando also starred in it and cast a lot of actors he had previously worked with.

The film has beautiful photography courtesy of Charles Lang a veteran Hollywood cinematographer and the decision to film on locations near the Pacific Ocean gave the film a very unusual setting for a western

 

Brando wasn't afraid to mix his cast with method and non method actors.  Karl Malden who had worked with Brando in A Streetcar Named Desire played Dad Longworth the man who betrays him during a bank robbery. Ben Johnson and Slim Pickens hardly ever though of as method actors much less actors at certain times, gave very impressive performances under Brando's direction.

For his leading lady as they like to say, Brando cast Pina Pellicer a Hispanic actor who was a rather troubled individual and committed suicide at age 30.

 

The original cut of the film was five hours, Paramount ended up reducing it to a running time of 141 minutes. The film had an extensive list of screenwriters including, Stanley Kubrick, Sam Peckinpah, Guy Walter Trosper,  Calder Baynard Willingham and Brando himself.